When You're Gone
by MyOnlyInspiration
Summary: This is set before the Lost Hero, and it's about when Annabeth finds out that Percy is missing. One shot.


Annabeth Chase had woken up in her cabin, nothing seeming out of the usual. Most of her demigod half siblings were still asleep, though those who were up could be seen slouched at their desk, reading or designing a structure.

She, of course, immediately went to her desk as soon as the normal morning grogginess left her. The plans for Olympus seemed to be going along nicely, though she thought that she could change a few things on certain immortal's temples...

After a little editing here and there on certain blueprints, Annabeth got out her clothes for the day- Her normal Camp Half-Blood t-shirt, grey skinny jeans, and some navy blue converse. She quickly changed into the said outfit, carelessly threw her hair back into a low ponytail, then walked outside.

The sunlight was nearly blinding, so mentioned daughter of wisdom tried to shield her eyes with her hand, though the attempt was nearly futile. She decided that she would need to ask the Apollo cabin if they could do something about this later...

She scanned the area, as to see if anything of concern or interest was happening. Campers were canoeing, tending to the strawberry fields, sparring, having a volleyball match, or otherwise just hanging out and talking. With a sigh, she decided to just get some breakfast, and see what happened from there.

Though it was silly, or at least she thought so, she wondered where Percy was. Probably still sleeping, she thought, smirking slightly as she was almost positive she was correct. But then again, she was just too prideful to admit she could be wrong. Hubris, or in other words pride, was her fatal flaw.

Eventually she made her way to the dining pavilion, occasionally stopping for small talk, though it was over nothing too important. As soon as she arrived, noise could be heard along with playful banter and laughing. Annabeth took her place at the Athena cabin table, next to her half brother Malcolm.

"Did you just wake up?" Malcolm asked playfully.

"Yeah, your snores were so loud I couldn't take it anymore," Annabeth retorted, standing up to place an offering into the flames.

"As if!" He called after her.

She just rolled her eyes at his antics, and carefully scraped some of her food into the flames, careful to state that the offering was for her mother. Then, she sat back down, and started eating quickly, so she could start the day off. Annabeth believed that she first had to go to the lava wall- Great, she thought, completely sarcastic.

When she was finished, she ditched her plate and jogged off, knowing fully well that the nymphs would take care of the mess. Arriving at the lava wall, her eyes widened, completely shocked at the sight in front of her.

"You...You replaced the lava with CHOCOLATE SYRUP?" Katie Gardiner, the head counselor of the Demeter cabin screamed at Travis Stoll.

"Well, yeah! Now that you mention it, I did!" Travis said, with a smirk to rival Chaos himself.

"Oh, you complete and utter-"

Annabeth cleared her throat interrupting her. Both of them turned to the daughter of Athena almost immediately. Katie seemed to be relieved for another semi-sane person, while Travis paled slightly.

"Was this really necessary?" Annabeth asked, crossing her arms with a slight glare.

"Of course it wasn't!" Travis exclaimed. "But was it fun? Yes! Very!"

"I'll just report this to Chiron," Annabeth sighed.

"Yeah, please do while I yell at this moron!" Katie shouted.

Annabeth thought that it was about time to get out of this situation, so she quickly made her way to the archery station, making a mental note to talk to the centaur. As she fingered a bow, she could hear an Apollo camper yelling something about explosive arrows. Deciding she would prefer not to know, she lifted up the bow and nocked an arrow.

She held the bow so it was straight, and pulled back the string so it was at the corner of her mouth. Making sure that both of her eyes were open, and her feet were in the correct position, she pulled back the string a little more before releasing it carefully.

And...

Annabeth missed the center. The arrow was lodged between two of the middle rings on the target, probably because she had forgotten to relax her elbow and take a deep breath before shooting. Also, she realized that she never truly aimed properly, which could have been another factor causing her to miss.

With a slight huff at her simple mistakes, she repeated the process, but this time her arrow hit the bullseye. Perfect, she thought, with a slight smirk. She continued practicing until her arm started hurting from the string digging into it, as she forgot to try to prevent that.

Next up was sword fighting, where Annabeth figured she would meet up with Percy. After all, he still couldn't be asleep, right? She hoped so anyways, desperately wanting to see him, even though she would never ever admit it. Though, it was obvious, as they were dating.

Oh, his ego doesn't need a boost, the daughter of Athena thought happily, nearly laughing at the thought. As she neared the arena, she saw a group of campers, who seemed to be only twelve or thirteen. Newbies.

Annabeth scanned the crowd, obviously looking for her black haired Seaweed Brain, who seemed to be nowhere in sight. She frowned, and figured that he must just be running late. What else could have been the reason, after all, this was Percy.

She had decided to start the lesson, as she didn't want to hold up any of the other campers, though she wished he was here. Annabeth would admit that she wasn't the best at sword-fighting, but she would just try the best that she could.

"Has anyone seen Percy?" Annabeth asked.

They all shook their heads no, so the daughter of Athena just started to teach. She picked up a celestial bronze sword, that wasn't too long or short, and it felt right in her grasp. She taught them how to parry, block, disarm, and several other techniques that could come in handy one day.

After Annaneth was finished, everyone was covered in sweat, bruises, and dirt, except her herself. She was starting to get worried about Percy, it might have seemed silly that she was, but she hadn't seen him all day. Deciding that she would check up on him after lunch, she made her way back to the dining pavilion.

She had grabbed her plate, and scraped off a piece of meat into the flames as an offering to Athena, before sitting back down. She ate as quickly as she could, nearly choking several times because of this, but it honestly didn't matter to her as she turned out to be okay. Her half siblings looked at Annabeth incredulously, but never spoke up to say anything.

As soon as she finished, she jumped up from her seat and bolted off to the Poseidon cabin. At first, Annabeth knocked on the door but to no prevail, so she eventually became frustrated and just opened the door. Wrinkling her nose at the sight of the mess, she made her way over to Percy's bed and moved away the covers, only to find...

That he was gone. Panic and worry immediately overcame her, but she decided against telling anyone yet. Maybe he was in the forest, or at the lake, or the infirmary even. Annabeth wouldn't jump to conclusions so quickly though, as that wouldn't be the logical thing to do.

She first decided to check the lake, as that seemed to be the most common place Percy was- After all, he is the son of Poseidon. Annabeth quickly rushed to the water's edge, but saw no sign of her Seaweed Brained boyfriend. Naturally, she tried to talk to the naiads to get an answer, but they just sprayed her with water.

Annabeth stormed off, her heart in her throat from worry. Where could he have gone? She next checked the infirmary, which only held a few campers from last nights caputure the flag game. However, there was still no sign of Percy...

All of her hope seemed to crumble just like a building, as he was nowhere to be found. How would she tell the others of her disappearance while she felt like breaking down and sobbing? What would she do? Annabeth decided that the first step would be to tell everyone, she would have to be strong.

Annabeth decided to announce it at dinner, as it was only in a few minutes and everyone would be gathered in the dining pavilion. As the time neared closer, headed towards the pavilion, prepared to give the dreadful news. How would everyone cope with it? Probably not well, that's for sure.

Instead of getting her food and scraping her offering into the flames like normally, Annabeth went straight to Dionysus and Chiron. They both looked at her incredulously, though Dionysus seemed more on the annoyed side- Obviously.

"What is it child?" Chiron asked lightheartedly.

"It's...I've got bad news," Annabeth informed them.

"Tell everyone what it is, then sit down and leave us alone Annabelle," Dionysus said in a bored tone.

The daughter of Athena, who ignored Dionysus' fake attempts at saying he didn't know her name, turned to the rest of the camp. She cleared her throat, while Chiron called for silence, which resulted in success.

"It's...About Percy," Annabeth said, taking a deep breath while keeping her eyes closed.

Nearly everyone tensed and exchanged nervous glances at her words. She couldn't blame them, after all. How could she? One of their biggest heroes, was said to have been involved in something including bad news.

"What about Perseus?" Chiron urged, a hint of anxiousness in his voice.

"He's missing," Annabeth continued, a single tear running down her cheek. "Percy's gone."

**Author's Note: Okay, I apologize for the quality as this was the first fan-fiction that I've ever written, though that's not much of an excuse. However, I had fun writing this, and I plan to make more...But I just don't have any ideas at the moment. So, bye for now!**


End file.
